


Wishful Thinking

by faithinthepoor



Series: Once Upon a Time [24]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-24
Updated: 2013-02-24
Packaged: 2017-12-03 10:34:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/697330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/faithinthepoor/pseuds/faithinthepoor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set during The Outsider</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wishful Thinking

**Author's Note:**

> In my series this follows my [Fairytale Drabbles](http://archiveofourown.org/works/618763), [Mirror Mirror](http://archiveofourown.org/works/618771), [This Provincial Life](http://archiveofourown.org/works/618775), [Viviane or Nimue](http://archiveofourown.org/works/618809), [Dreams and Wishes](http://archiveofourown.org/works/618851), [All the Better To….](http://archiveofourown.org/works/619484), [Magic Keys](http://archiveofourown.org/works/619497), [Curiouser and Curiouser](http://archiveofourown.org/works/619514), [Snow Blind](http://archiveofourown.org/works/620280), [Spinning Straw](http://archiveofourown.org/works/620288), [Wooden Hearts](http://archiveofourown.org/works/621128), [Poisoned](http://archiveofourown.org/works/622526), [True Love and Other Curses](http://archiveofourown.org/works/625038), [Spellbound](http://archiveofourown.org/works/628806), [Over the Rainbow](http://archiveofourown.org/works/630076), [Facades](http://archiveofourown.org/works/632227), [Lost Girls](http://archiveofourown.org/works/636939), [Monstrosities](http://archiveofourown.org/works/640162), [Love and Lies](http://archiveofourown.org/works/652912), [Something Wicked this Way Comes](http://archiveofourown.org/works/665458), [Dreamscapes](http://archiveofourown.org/works/672345) and [Homecomings](http://archiveofourown.org/works/676052) and [Test Match](http://archiveofourown.org/works/682287)

There are things that she really should have learnt by now. Top of that list is that she should be careful what she wishes for. Wishing, no matter how well intentioned, is not something that has ever worked out well for her. She doesn’t think that wishing is pointless, just that it’s pointless for her. It always has been, even before everything fell apart, before she changed. Back then her wishes were simple – all she wanted was to be free to be herself. She was naïve and trusting enough to believe that such things were not only simple but also remotely possible.

Wanting to be herself turned about to be her greatest undoing. If she could have just understood and accepted her fate earlier her life would have been so very different. It wouldn’t have been good, that was never on the cards for her, but it wouldn’t have been quite so terrible. At the very least she might have been able to look in a mirror and not hate the face staring back at her.

The mirror thing is quite a problem at the moment. The room is full of them. She knows this is her doing, she designed this alleged safe haven, but she can’t imagine why this was ever what she thought she wanted. This space is the exact opposite of safe. It’s everything that she tried to escape. It’s soulless. It’s evil. It may shine with opulence but its beauty can’t disguise what it is. It is a lair. 

This isn’t her world anymore. This isn’t what comforts her. She looks around and notices that all of her prized possessions, all of her trophies, only make her feel cold. Maybe that’s all they ever did. Maybe she just didn’t notice it before. She was cold then too. 

Nowadays she is not exactly warm but it appears she has thawed a little. She’s not sure how long that will last though. The things that made her warm are disappearing – the child who trusted her to pick him up when he fell and let her kiss him goodnight is long gone and the woman who made her believe that it was possible that she wouldn’t always have to be alone will grow up one day too. Their love and light will fade and Regina will again learn to embrace the cold.

One day she will be okay with all of this. One day she will accept that all life can ever offer her is glass and hard edges. This is the lesson that she has failed to learn. This is the thing that she keeps fighting against and in doing so she crushes herself over and over again.

Evil queens do not get to be loved. They don’t get happy endings. They are lucky if they get to survive until the end of the story. She shouldn’t have dared to believe that coming to Storybrooke would make things different. You can take the Evil Queen out of the Enchanted Forrest but she’s still just an evil queen. She should have worked with what she had. She could have had Henry and Emma’s eternal devotion; all she needed to do was take their hearts and add them to her collection. They would have been mindless drones but at least they would have been her mindless drones.

Even now, when it is clear to her that all she will ever be is an evil queen, she can’t stomach the thought of doing that do them. The woman who has tortured, maimed, murdered and flayed with the flick of her wrist apparently has her limits. Those limits are what make her weak. They are why her mother will win.

She always thought that the death of Daniel was the defining moment of her life but it was just a symptom not the cause. She hasn’t changed anywhere near as much as she thought she had. Her problem is the same as it has always been. Her problem is that she cares and because of that she is vulnerable to abuse. If she was evil to the core she would have had a better a life, it’s the goodness in her that has been her downfall. It turned her into a monster once before and it will do it again.

Her heart may have shrunk and the goodness in her is little more than a slither but she can feel it inside her. It’s the part that is not all right with any of this, the part that keeps on insisting that wishes are possible. It’s the reason she has had to ostracize herself. The good in her still believes that if she tries hard enough she can save Henry and Emma, even if she has to lose herself in the process, and because of that she endangers all three of them.

She extinguishes the lights in the room. The dark is better. It doesn’t temp her with reflective surfaces. She doesn’t want to go back to that. She doesn’t want to live her life spying on people in her mirrors, especially not her loved ones. It would make it harder not to be with them but it’s more than that, she also fears what she might see.

Emma knows that Regina didn’t kill Archie, she has to, but Emma is the only one. Regina wonders how long it will be until that knowledge doesn’t matter, until Emma comes to see Regina the way those around her do. Watching her lover tell her son about her alleged crime was one of the worst moments of Regina’s life. If Henry’s stricken reaction was any guide he still cared about her but she had to sit there and watch Emma deal the death blow to any good will that Henry had towards the woman who raised him.

She sat in her car until her tears would no longer fall. She watched the bench long after Emma and Henry had left. That spot, that moment, was going to be the last place she ever saw them. She had promised Emma that their separation would only be temporary, and she had believed it at the time, but it is clear now that this can’t be anything other than permanent. 

Regina underestimated her mother. She knows it was Cora who framed her. Regina spent her life fearing her mother but it’s becoming apparent that in the past her mother treated her with kid gloves. It makes sense; she was a child at the time. She’s not a child anymore and the gloves have definitely come off. Her mother’s opening salvo was nothing short of devastating. Regina will never be able to clear her name. Not when her supposed crime has been witnessed. 

Time hasn’t often been on Regina’s side but in this instance it clearly was. Against all reason and better judgment she was with Emma that night so she knows that Emma is aware that she is innocent but even though Emma knows the truth the thought of Emma having to see those images unsettles her. She’s glad that Emma’s belief in her wasn’t actually tested because she’s not sure that it’s a test that she would pass.

She worries that the magical version of events Emma witnessed will come to seem more real than the truth but it’s probably better that way. Emma needs to move on. Emma has to be strong. She needs to be the one to protect Henry now; there is no place in Emma’s life for feelings for a woman who was only ever going to fail her. That doesn’t mean that Regina’s happy about it. She is, in fact, pissed as hell. She is particularly pissed that she wasn’t there to see Emma use her magic for the first time.

It was always going to happen. She felt the strength of the force within Emma when the portal opened and she has felt Emma’s magic calling to hers every single time they have managed to touch since. It the fates weren’t so cruel they could have been glorious together. The thought arouses her more than she cares to admit. She wishes she could make it go away and while this wish is as pointless as all of her others, there are moments when she can almost make it come true.

She can’t remove her craving for Emma’s magic but she can replace her thoughts about that with thoughts of a different kind of magic. The magic they make together.

She had woken feeling stiff and sore. She was lying on her side and her hip pushed painfully into the hard floor.

“Welcome back,” Emma said with tenderness but Regina could sense tension behind the words.

“Are you mad at me?”

“Not really.”

“Okay so that’s a yes then.”

“Do you really believe this is our last time, for now?” Emma emphasised the last two words.

“Yes. It has to be.”

“Then how could you fall asleep?” Regina laughed in response to Emma’s words and pulled herself up to kiss Emma. “This is not a laughing matter Regina. We missed precious time together.”

“Emma, I’m an old woman, I do not have your stamina.”

“I’m not asking for a sex decathlon,” Emma’s eyes had narrowed as she traced her finger between Regina’s breasts, “but then again that’s not the worst idea ever.”

“What idea did you have before the decathlon came into your head?”

“It was nothing. It’s certainly not important now.” Emma rolled onto her side and hooked her leg over Regina’s hip.

“I want to know anyway.”

Emma let out a frustrated sigh. “I thought we should talk but that was a bad idea. This,” she placed a kiss to Regina’s neck, “is a much, much better idea.”

“But what did you want to talk about?”

“Not now. Maybe later,” Emma said as she continued to kiss and nip at Regina’s neck.

“We may not have a later.”

Regina’s words had stopped Emma in her tracks but her eyes burned with need, “All the more reason to not waste it talking.”

“You think talking to me would be a waste of time?” she had tried not to sound as hurt as she felt.

“Well now I feel that it’s impossible to do the right thing.”

“Because to you sex feels like the right thing?”

“Well sex with you is pretty amazing,” Emma said with a lascivious grin. 

“But talking would be nice too,” Regina had insisted.

“It would,” Emma reluctantly agreed, “but I can think of one or two things that it would lack.” She ran a finger over Regina’s nipple.

“I’ve never really had anyone to talk to,” Regina whispered softly.

This time Regina’s words do appear to have a real impact on Emma. “Neither have I.”

“Not even Mary Margaret?’ Regina could feel a strange jealousy bubbling inside of her.

“When I thought she was my friend I could talk to her about certain things. Not much though. Her delicate system wouldn’t have been to handle it.”

Regina could feel a smirk forming on her face but it died quickly, “But she’s not so delicate now.”

“Now, she thinks she’s my mother and that only makes it worse. I lost a friend and I’m not sure I’m happy with what I got in exchange.”

“You miss talking to her?”

“I do.”

“And yet you feel that time spent talking to me would be wasted,” the jealousy had returned and it tinged her voice. 

“It’s not that. I want to talk to you. I want to talk to you all the time. Whenever anything happens to me – good or bad, big or small – you are the first person I think about. The first person I want to tell.”

“So why does that never happen?” Regina propped herself up on her elbow and played with Emma’s hair.

“When I’m with you other things no longer feel important. There’s no need to talk about them any more. It’s stupid but when I’m with you the rest of my life doesn’t seem to matter.”

“It’s not stupid,” Regina said.

“But Regina that doesn’t mean that this is just about sex for me.”

“Even if that sex is pretty amazing?” Regina mocked.

Emma smiled and took Regina’s hand. “Are you upset that I only said it was _pretty_ amazing.”

“Trust me dear I do not need to be told how amazing I am at sex.”

“Such confidence,” Emma teased.

“I’ve had to be confident about those abilities,” Regina said with a bitterness that she didn’t want to bring to this moment.

“And here I thought you got what you wanted with magic.”

Regina could tell that Emma was trying to keep things light but it was a little too late for that, “Magic doesn’t get you everything.”

“What and sex gets you the rest?” Emma’s voice had taken on an angry edge

“I’m not going to deny that I’ve had a lot of sex.”

“Thank you for clearing that up. I feel a whole lot better,” Emma released her grip on Regina’s hand.

Regina moved that same hand to cup Emma’s face, “But I’ve never slept with someone I love before.”

Emma looked conflicted. Regina could tell Emma wanted to ask her something but didn’t seem to be able to. In the end she settled for kissing Regina. When the kiss ended Emma pulled Regina to nestle against her and stroked her hair. 

“I didn’t mean to kill the mood,” Regina apologised, “I just wanted you to know that.”

She felt a kiss being placed on the crown of her head. “I’m glad you told me.”

“And I’m glad you tolerate me, you’re the only one who does.”

“Regina I think tolerate is what most people do when it comes to you but it is not at all a word that applies to me,” She didn’t need to be able to see Emma to know that Emma was smiling.

“No,” Regina corrected, “you are the only one who tolerates _me_.”

“Of course I do. I love you.”

“You are the only one who has claimed to do that who hasn’t placed conditions on that love.”

“What about him?” Emma asked hesitantly.

Regina didn’t need Emma to clarify, “Well maybe not him but that was a very long time ago. Everyone else has conditions or at least requirements, even Henry.”

“Henry’s young. This is all difficult for him.”

“He’s not too young to make it clear that he can only like me if I don’t use magic. Well not unless that magic is to bring back the mother he really wants.”

“I never meant to cause a problem between the two of you.”

“You didn’t.”

“I feel like I should be offended,” Emma said. 

Regina held her tighter. “He went looking for you Miss Swan,” her use of the term was gentle and playful, “the problem was already there. I caused it. I don’t love very well. I think maybe that’s what happens when everyone tells you that you have to change because you are not good enough to be loved.”

“You should never have to feel that way.”

“I don’t when I’m with you.”

“I’m glad I make you feel tolerated.”

“Me too,” she said with all sincerity.

“Are you feeling tolerated enough that we can stop talking?”

She laughed and then with a little bit of effort managed to pull Emma on top of her. “You know what? I think maybe I am.”

“Good,” Emma kissed her deeply, “because I want you to know that you make me feel tolerated too.”

She smiles at the memory. Memories are all that she is ever going to have of Emma but that’s for the best. Cora can come for her. Cora can break her into a thousand tiny little pieces and mould Regina to her will but there are things that Cora can never do. Cora can’t change the way it felt to be held by Emma or the way Emma’s kisses sometimes had the ability to take away a lifetime of pain. 

There is no point wishing for a future with Emma because by the time Cora is done with Regina, Emma is unlikely to want her. Wishing can’t change her future, it never could, but she’s glad she was never able to give up on wishing because things like Emma don’t happen to someone like Regina. Not unless they wish really, really hard.


End file.
